


Ubi sunt gaudia

by regshoe



Category: Raffles - E. W. Hornung
Genre: Christmas, Getting Together, M/M, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-18 03:34:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21921115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/regshoe/pseuds/regshoe
Summary: Raffles and Bunny escape London for a peaceful Christmas holiday together in the countryside.
Relationships: Bunny Manders/A. J. Raffles
Comments: 20
Kudos: 29
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	Ubi sunt gaudia

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cerberusia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerberusia/gifts).



> I was inspired by your letter to write this—I thought Raffles and Bunny might adapt very well to a rural setting at Christmas! Hope you enjoy, and have a lovely Yuletide.
> 
> Thanks very much to thechestofsilver for beta reading!

A view of pale, featureless grey clouds was reflected in the windows of Piccadilly, and the chimney-stacks above were almost lost in the chilly fog. Horses' hooves splashed through the mud of the street below, and the steadily falling rain did nothing to improve the state of the ground. The occupants of hansom-cabs and omnibuses sat huddled up on their seats, shielding themselves from the weather as best they could, while those unfortunate pedestrians who must venture out on such a day hurried on their various ways, clutching coats and shawls tightly round themselves.

'Altogether a thoroughly miserable prospect,' was Raffles's verdict on the scene. He and Bunny were sitting together beside the windows of his Albany rooms, until this moment in comfortable silence; a Sullivan was between Raffles's fingers, and Bunny had just returned to his armchair after getting up to add more coals to the fire. 'I can't bear London in December,' Raffles continued. 'I've quite a mind to leave it altogether, and go to spend Christmas somewhere out in the country, where December is beautiful.'

'That sounds an appealing plan,' murmured Bunny, leaning back in his chair with his eyes closed.

'You could come with me, Bunny! How would you like that—and I dare say we can both afford a holiday, after the success of our last little adventure. Come and spend Christmas with me in some delightful little rural hideaway.'

Bunny, eyes open now and smiling, sat up. 'Is that your only reason for wanting to get away from London?' A note of suspicion had entered his voice.

'Well,' said Raffles slowly, 'perhaps dear Inspector MacKenzie has been a little too hot on my trail of late. I don't deny it would be convenient to leave his and his fellows' haunts for a time.'

'And perhaps,' said Bunny, 'near to the spot you have in mind is a country house, where there lives a lady with a famous diamond necklace, or a family renowned for their priceless silver plate...?'

'Bunny, you wound me!' This was met with a little smile; Bunny was growing wise as to his habits. 'My intentions are pure...' Raffles looked back out of the window, to the clouds and the rain and the mud, '...as the driven snow.'

*

It was late in the afternoon, and Liverpool Street far behind them, when they arrived at the little station. They loaded their luggage onto a dog-cart, but decided themselves to walk the rest of the way to their destination. The country around was flat and open, and as they set off down the lane which, the stationmaster informed them, led to the village, there was nothing to obscure the brilliant colours of the sunset, deep red against the horizon fading to brushstrokes of pale gold upon the wispy clouds above their heads.

A field of sheep, apparently heedless of the beauty above them, watched the two men pass.

'What I would not give to have some of that gold for myself!' said Raffles as they walked along. The lane was deeply rutted and no less muddy than the streets of London had been, but surely it was worthwhile for such a picture.

'It is certainly lovely,' said Bunny, meditatively. 'I believe your idea of leaving London for Christmas was a very good one, Raffles. I can't imagine any sort of crime or suspicion of crime haunting such a place as this. No policeman waiting at the street corner—no Mackenzie... It is good to get away from such things for a while.'

'Do you think so?' said Raffles. 'Well, I suppose...' He trailed off. He supposed, in fact, that it might indeed be a good thing for them both; but he could wish that Bunny had not made those insinuations about the country house and the famous diamonds, for there was such a house and there were such diamonds, about a mile from the village to which they were going. Perhaps he might conclude from Bunny's last remarks that he had forgotten all about it.

The day had been cold and would only get colder. ' _Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone_ ' beneath their feet, and they had to pick their way carefully down the shallow slope of the lane leading into the village. By now the thatched roofs of the houses and the spire of the church were silhouetted against a deepening blue twilight. Bunny took Raffles's arm to steady himself on the icy ground.

'Now, there, I believe'—Raffles pulled his arm away, rather abruptly, if not guiltily, to point out the large building by the side of the road, with lights gleaming in all the ground-floor windows—'is our destination!'

'And a very welcome sight it is,' said Bunny with feeling, pushing his hands into the pockets of his overcoat.

*

'I believe I shall do some serious writing while I am here,' said Bunny later on, as he unpacked their suitcases in the little room at the top of the inn's winding staircase. 'It's such a picturesque spot, the very place for literary inspiration. I am contemplating a Christmas story: a quaint rural setting, the season of goodwill—just the thing for the London magazines.'

'Ah, a moral tale!' Raffles was lying back on one of the narrow beds, hands folded behind his head. 'Quite the thing. You shall be the next Dickens, old chap.'

Bunny looked up a little sharply at this, but meeting Raffles's guileless smile he returned to folding the clothes. When he had finished this, and when Raffles had so far exerted himself as to put the suitcases away in the big oaken cupboard that took up most of one wall of their room, they sent downstairs for a supper of crumpets and sat toasting them before the bright fire.

'Yes, I rather think a place like this would provide some material for an interesting moral tale,' said Raffles, as though there had been no pause in the conversation. He adjusted his crumpet on the end of its fork and went on, 'There are all sorts of possibilities in a remote country village.'

'What sorts of possibilities?'

'Oh, possibilities of scandal, horrible rumours, that sort of thing. In London one can hardly keep track of what four or five million of one's neighbours are doing at any time, but when those neighbours are only a few dozen—what delightful possibilities for the curious and imaginative gossip! And the more sordid sorts of crime, of course—but I must not talk of such things now. It is the season of peace and goodwill, after all, and we have no villainous plans in mind today.' He smiled.

'I should hope not!' said Bunny, and the strength of his tone caused Raffles to look up questioningly. 'Oh, I only mean what I said earlier, that it is good to go quite away from such things, crime and the suspicion of crime—but with you.' He looked away.

Raffles watched him steadily for a few moments, but said nothing. It was better, he thought, to say nothing more about his feelings on the topic; Bunny might not believe him, and somehow he could not regard that prospect with his usual equanimity. He rose from the chair, putting down his plate and toasting-fork, and said, 'Quite. Well, I am for bed. It's been a long day enough, Bunny.'

They undressed and climbed under their respective covers, and said nothing more until Raffles, taking up the one remaining lighted candle, paused with it in his hand to say, 'Goodnight, Bunny.'

'Night, Raffles,' sounded sleepily from the other bed.

Raffles smiled very slightly, and blew out the candle.

*

'Ah, Bunny! Have you had a successful expedition?'

It was the middle of the next day, and Raffles was sitting in an armchair by the window of their room, reading a book on the geography of the county which had been left on the mantelpiece alongside a few decorative sprigs of holly. Bunny had gone out earlier that morning determined on gathering material for his Christmas story, and now stood gratefully before the fire, pulling off several layers of scarves and gloves.

'Very successful,' he said. 'I asked the way to the church of a dear little grey-haired lady, and we fell into conversation and became good friends. I asked her about the sorts of things that go on here, and I have learnt from her absolutely everything there is to hear about the dramas and intrigues of the place—I was shocked to hear that it has so many. Apparently the latest was a vicious argument that happened over the choice of carols for this year's Christmas services. You were right about the possibilities for scandal in such a place as this, you know.'

Raffles laughed heartily. 'Ah, " _every prospect pleases_ ", my dear chap,' he said, and added, 'but it would be hard to find one more pleasing than this, for all that.' He gestured out of the diamond-paned window, to where the spire of St Mary's church stood amidst a latticework of winter trees. 'And it will provide you with excellent fodder for your Christmas tale! In place of a Scrooge, you shall have a harmless-looking country spinster, or a mean-minded young curate, whose heart has been poisoned by gossip and scandal, redeemed by the simple innocence of the season of goodwill.'

Bunny looked at him with a curious, though not an unsmiling expression. 'You've such an imagination,' he said after a pause, 'you ought to write the thing yourself.'

'I have not your way with words, old chap,' said Raffles airily. 'And neither, I am afraid, has this fellow'—indicating the book in his hands—'so I rather think we shall leave him behind and go in search of some lunch.'

Between them, they got to know various of the village's inhabitants over the next few days: there was Miss Burwell, Bunny's new friend of the first morning, who sang in the choir; the eccentric old lady with whom she lived as companion, and who kept a bewildering number and variety of dogs; and the vicar, Mr Plumstead, a mild and amiable man who was obviously proud of this little corner of the world—in which he had lived in contentment ever since leaving Oxford ten or twelve years ago—and who was happy to show them round.

'Yes, it's good to see people visiting—it does liven up the place,' he said, after Bunny had explained how he and Raffles had decided to come here from London. 'We've had quite a number of visitors lately, in fact, what with you two fellows and the other one, that Scotch policeman chap.'

Raffles and Bunny exchanged a glance.

'He's come down from London like yourselves—I don't suppose you've met?'

'I believe we may know each other in town,' said Raffles carefully. 'You must introduce us.'

As it turned out, however, there was no need for introductions, for they met Mackenzie in the street as they walked together back to the inn.

'Speak of the devil,' said Raffles in an undertone, and then out loud, 'Inspector Mackenzie! Why, what a pleasant surprise. Are you down here on holiday, then, like ourselves?'

The inspector turned and regarded Raffles with a look considerably chillier than the clear December day. 'Quite the coincidence,' he said.

'Why,' said Raffles, still beaming at Mackenzie, 'it's almost as though you had followed me all the way from London! But perhaps it's no surprise that we chose the same place for a holiday, since you are undoubtedly a man of taste and discernment. You are here on holiday, I suppose,' he added, allowing a note of concern to enter his voice. 'It's not a professional visit?'

'That it is not,' said Mackenzie. 'I was recommended to come here by Mr Norton, who is an acquaintance of mine.' He laid a slight emphasis upon the name, which was that of the steward at the nearby great house; as Mackenzie no doubt knew, he was at present keeping watch on the place in the absence of the family.

'Well,' said Raffles, 'I'm sure we shall see you here and there—must be going, you know. Good day!'

He turned to leave, taking Bunny's arm; but he did not turn away too soon to see the wary eye with which Mackenzie watched them go.

*

It was evident that Mackenzie had followed them from London with the intention of keeping them under his watch—and he had made no attempt to conceal himself from them, so he wished them to know themselves watched. Quite what he thought they had planned Raffles did not conjecture; but, in any case, his presence prevented them from doing anything in the least bit suspicious.

And so the next few days were, by necessity, very quiet and rather constrained. Bunny spent much of the time scribbling away at the table in their room, and soon had what he said felt like a creditable first draft of his Christmas story. While he worked, Raffles would at times sit in one of the armchairs beside the fire, reading, smoking or else simply watching Bunny quietly. The way he would write furiously for half a minute or so while the inspiration was on him, before suddenly pausing and holding the pen above the paper as his brow furrowed, thinking out how to compose the next sentence; the look on his face as he gazed out of the window, turning over some as yet formless idea; all these things were endlessly fascinating to Raffles, and though he did not trouble to interrogate the feeling in any very great depth there was a sort of undefined pleasure in indulging it so. Occasionally Bunny would look up, see him and smile in a slightly puzzled way before returning to the half-filled page in front of him.

Yes, it had been a good decision to come out here with Bunny for the holiday—but the time was a little constrained, all the same.

The rest of the time Raffles spent exploring the village and the country around. He visited St Mary's, admiring the architecture and examining the notices of the Christmas services, which were to include a Midnight Mass. It was a rather singular building, apparently dating back to the Normans; parts of it were built from unshaped flint nodules rather than stone blocks, giving it an ancient and unsophisticated look which contrasted pleasingly with the ornate decoration inside. He measured the distance to the next neighbouring village, which stood on a slight rise to the south, and admired the view back across the flat fields, with the line of the railway curving across them and a little copse of birch and alder trees in the middle distance to lend some variety to the landscape. The low December sun cast a golden light over all. It would make a fine picture, if only he had thought to bring paints and canvas with him!

On one such ramble, in the middle of the afternoon as the light was just beginning to go, he was making his way round the back of the village, following a footpath along one of those broad ditches that served in this part of the country to keep the low ground dry. All was quite silent: even the little breeze scarcely made a sound as it lifted the twigs of the straggling hawthorns that grew along the ditch. High up above, a small group of rooks and jackdaws flapped raggedly home to their roost in like silence.

But, after a while, a new sound began. This path joined the main street by winding around a side of the church, and there the choir—about whose abilities he had already heard much from the proud Mr Plumstead—were evidently at their practice. The sound of their hymn drifted across the cold air, growing stronger and clearer as Raffles approached closer to the church.

' _In dulci jubilo_ , let us our homage show!  
Our hearts' joy reclineth _in praesepio..._ '

Raffles smiled wryly: the choir were in fine voice this afternoon, but he did not feel so very joyful. He looked up through the fringes of the hawthorn hedge, where a distant glimmer brighter than the fading sun was just visible in one of the first-floor rooms of the inn.

'Cheerful sound, isn't it!' cried a voice behind Raffles, and he turned to see Mr Plumstead, struggling with the leads of three large and excited dogs.

'Certainly,' said Raffles. 'Just what I hoped to find in coming here.'

'Deeply were we stained _per nostra crimina_  
But Thou hast for us gained _coelorum gaudia..._ '

One of the dogs, a black Labrador with a lolling tongue and a tail apparently powered by clockwork, chose this moment to leap up happily towards Raffles, transferring no small amount of mud from its paws to his overcoat.

'Down, boy!' said the vicar, to little avail. 'Oh dear, I do apologise, Mr Raffles.'

'It's quite all right. He's a fine fellow.' He patted the animal's head, while stepping nimbly out of range of any further muddying, and addressed it in mock solemnity. 'There, it is terribly exciting to be out on a walk on such a fine day, isn't it? I should think you're quite sensible to be so happy.'

'Shall we be seeing you and your friend at any of the Christmas services?' asked Mr Plumstead, once the Labrador's excitement at finding such an excellent new friend was calmed a little.

'Yes,' said Raffles musingly, 'I was rather thinking of attending your Midnight Mass. It's always appealed to me, at this time of year, and with such a fine choir I believe it will be very much worth hearing—and seeing.'

'Excellent! I'll look forward to seeing you there,' said the vicar, beaming. 'Well'—for they had reached the lane behind the church, where the singers had fallen silent—'I had better go and give them some praise and encouragement. They certainly deserve it. Good afternoon, Mr Raffles!'

'Good afternoon.' And Raffles turned in the opposite direction, back towards the inn and the light in the window.

*

'I ran into Mackenzie again this morning.'

'Oh?' Raffles looked up from his book with one eyebrow raised. 'Still hot on my trail, is he? Well, what did he say to you?'

'He asked me if I'd been over to look at the great house—clearly with another meaning than tourism in mind. I said I had not. Then he asked if you had been there.'

'And, of course, you said I had not either.'

'Naturally.' This was a lie—Raffles had, in fact, been to have a look at the place on one of his afternoon walks, but it was as well to throw off suspicion as much as possible. 'He gave me a very unpleasant look and said "Aye" in a nastily sceptical tone.'

'Good old Mackenzie!' said Raffles happily, and then, seeing the look on Bunny's face, 'My dear Bunny, you're not seriously worried about him, are you? I assure you we are in no danger whatsoever from him—we are simply wasting his time and the resources of Scotland Yard, which I, for one, am quite happy to continue doing. And, besides,' he added, 'after the contrivance with which you evaded capture for us both in Grosvenor Street the week before last, I should say you were more than a match for his cunning.'

This reference to Bunny's ingenuity during their latest burglarious adventure—which had, indeed, saved them both from what might have been a very awkward encounter, and secured a handsome set of valuables from being restored to their lawful owners—clearly pleased him. Raffles would have given a great deal to have Bunny look at him like that again. He still was not sure that Bunny really believed he had come here with no plans at all involving the great house in his mind—oh, he had been aware of it and its diamonds when he chose the place, of course he had, he must be, but no more than that—and, if he were entirely honest with himself, must admit that his past behaviour had given Bunny ample grounds for mistrusting him. He did not like to think of that now—not when Bunny was looking at him with such an admiring light in his eyes.

But, in any case, the attempt at distracting Bunny from the main point at issue had not worked, for now he turned away and sighed, in that terribly eloquent way he had sometimes. 'I'm not worried in the way you mean,' he said, leaving his place by the window to come and lean over the back of Raffles's armchair. 'But—I had hoped, when we came here, to leave all of that behind in London—the knowledge of guilt, the suspense of always looking over one's shoulder. To put it quite frankly, Raffles, I wanted a rest from it. To arrive here and find an officer of the Yard, who has been suspecting you for months, still behind us—well, it quite ruins the thing.'

Raffles said nothing, but reached his hand up, found Bunny's hand where it lay on the back of the chair and squeezed it. For his part, he felt that his own life would be rather dull without those things that Bunny so hated—but they had never seen eye to eye on such things, and there was little point in re-treading old arguments at this time, of all times.

'And,' Bunny went on in a lower voice, not letting go of Raffles's hand, 'I had hoped to spend the time with you—very simply.' That sentence sounded as though it might have been longer, but Raffles made no reply. 'To know that you are still watched, under suspicion, still seen as—well, as what you are, but I don't mean—'

'I quite understand, Bunny,' said Raffles, devoutly hoping he did. 'Come and sit down.'

Bunny did so, and there followed a several minutes' silence while Raffles fetched water for the kettle and set about making them both some tea.

'I think,' he said eventually, by way of a change of subject, 'that I shall go to Midnight Mass at St Mary's tonight.'

Bunny took a sip of his tea. 'Really? You've never been a great one for religion, Raffles.'

'Perhaps I have not,' said Raffles, smiling, 'but it promises to be a very beautiful occasion—the light of hope, shining in the darkest of nights—and I have always been one for beauty, as I'm sure you'll agree. And besides, the picture of the infant Christ in the manger always puts one so pleasingly in mind of the value of innocence.'

'Now you're not being serious,' said Bunny, pouring out more tea for them both.

'I am entirely serious,' protested Raffles. 'Come with me, dear fellow. I really think it would do you good.'

*

As they made their way downstairs that night they met the innkeeper and his wife, who evidently also intended to go to St Mary's, for they were putting on their coats and gloves in the hallway. Raffles suggested that they walk together, to which they both happily agreed; 'but our other visitor, the Scotch detective, shall not be joining us,' remarked the innkeeper's wife, 'for he left by the five o'clock train.'

'Oh, did he?' said Raffles, glancing at Bunny.

'He said that urgent matters called him away to Edinburgh,' she said, 'and that, in any case, he had nothing more to keep him here. He seemed in quite a foul mood, poor fellow.'

'I, for one, shan't miss him greatly,' said the innkeeper.

'No,' replied Bunny, but he was looking up at Raffles. 'I can't say I will, either.'

They entered the church in near-darkness, with only the steady glimmer of a few well-placed candles shining upon the ancient flints. Raffles accepted a copy of _Hymns Ancient and Modern_ from the smiling churchwarden who greeted them, and Bunny took from a tray in the porch a little wax candle with a paper shield around it. The light in the church grew steadily as the members of the congregation lighted these candles one from another. As they took their seats, Bunny waved to Miss Burwell who sat in the choir.

The murmur of conversation fell quiet all at once as the choir rose to begin their first hymn, which Raffles was rather amused to recognise as the same one he had heard them practising a few days earlier. The harmonies of the first few lines, echoing through the cold and candlelit air, gave just the impression they were intended to convey of a light of hope shining in the darkness. The artistic effect was perfect. As Mr Plumstead, flanked by two acolytes, made his entrance, Raffles looked down at the candle in Bunny's hand; Bunny smiled back at him. It was no distant light now.

*

The way back led them past the same spot where, a few days earlier, Raffles had first stopped to hear the choir singing. Now it was truly silent, though not so dark as it might have been: a thin scattering of snow had fallen during the service, but the clouds from which it had fallen had drifted onwards, and now it reflected the light of moon and stars. Raffles lowered the lantern he carried and let the stars light their way.

The other attendees at Midnight Mass had hurried back to their warm beds, and it was ' _above the deep and dreamless sleep_ ' of the little village that those stars shone now. Here in the lane, the two of them were quite alone. Raffles, however, was in a sentimental mood tonight, and liked to tarry and enjoy the quiet night and the bright snow.

'Cold, Bunny?' Bunny had taken Raffles's arm and huddled up close to him as they walked together.

'It would be difficult not to be.'

Raffles laughed softly. 'Oh, but out of all this there comes hope, eh, my dear rabbit?' He squeezed Bunny's arm and looked upwards. 'It may be a cold night, but such beauty as this can hardly inspire despair only.'

Bunny stopped still, and looked at Raffles with an expression that he could not read. 'Really, to hear you talk,' he said quietly, 'one would think there was no such thing as London or burglary in the world, and that you were entirely an innocent man.' 

Raffles had often, in the pauses that fell between their lighter conversations together, suspected his rabbit of thoughts along these lines, but he had never spoken them so plainly before. Perhaps it was a time for saying things not usually said. He met Bunny's eyes. 'Who is to say I am not, on this night?'

Slowly, Bunny moved his hand down to rest on Raffles's own hand. 'I shall not—on this night.'

Raffles gripped his fingers tightly. 'I will admit that our little holiday has not been all it might have been, for you,' he said, 'but I hope it need not continue so constrained as it has been.'

And Bunny's reply to this left him in no doubt whether that hope would be fulfilled.

A little while later, the lane was once again quite deserted; and the stars shone down on the snow, unbroken save where two pairs of footprints, set very close together, led back towards the village.

*

'This will amuse you, my dear Bunny,' said Raffles, striding into their room one morning a few days later. He brandished a newspaper. 'Sensational capture of a notorious murderer in Edinburgh—thanks to the efforts of the brave Scottish police and their redoubtable assistant, Inspector Mackenzie of Scotland Yard.'

'Really—is that what called him away from us?' Bunny was sitting on the bed (what was previously two narrow beds had been pushed together in the middle of the room), organising the pages on which were written the draft of his Christmas story—to be put away for revision and publication in time for next year's festivities.

'Apparently so,' said Raffles. 'Well, it sounds as though he is having an entertaining Christmas holiday. No rest for the wicked, eh, Bunny?' He sat down on the bed and placed an arm round Bunny's waist.

'Oh, I don't know,' said Bunny, leaning comfortably against him. 'I believe some of the wicked, at least, have had a very pleasant and restful Christmas.'

Raffles laughed.

'However,' he said presently, 'I think it's time we were getting back to London. We have had quite the perfect holiday'—Bunny murmured his agreement—'but there are so many things to do in town. It's really past time we were back there. And, you know, if Mackenzie is still elsewhere...'

Bunny raised his eyebrows.

'...I might confess that there is one house that I have had my eye on since before we left—the family are spending the New Year at their place in Westmorland and will not be back for another week at least. In their absence the house presents certain opportunities.'

Bunny disengaged himself from Raffles's arms and looked at him with an expression that was half exasperation, half affection. 'I ought to have known,' he said.

It was, Raffles felt, something indeed to be regarded with a look like that. He leaned across and kissed Bunny. 'Oh, but you will come and help me, won't you? I'm sure I couldn't carry out my plans without you there.'

Now Bunny was really smiling. 'Of course I will,' he said, and leaned in for another kiss.

**Author's Note:**

> The title is Latin for 'where those joys are' or 'where are those joys?', and it's another line from 'In dulci jubilo', the bilingual carol that the choir sing here. Thanks to Prinzenhasserin for help with the Latin!


End file.
